There are several configuration tabs available on the property page of a Hyper-V host in VMM. In the first part of this article series, we explained the items that are available on the Status and General Tabs. We also explained a few items that are available on the Hardware tab such as processor details, if processor supports SLAT or not, and configuring NUMA for a Hyper-V host.

When you add a Hyper-V host under VMM management, VMM Agent collects all settings configured on the Hyper-V host, including local and remote storage devices attached to a Hyper-V host. VMM Agent also collects volumes configured on the Hyper-V host. Clicking the Hardware tab and expanding the “Storage” section will provide you the list of volumes that have been created on the Hyper-V host as shown in the figure 1.0 below:

Figure 1.0: Storage Section on Hardware Tab

As you can see in the above screenshot, there are three volumes configured on the Hyper-V host; C:\ and E:\ and F:\. When you click on each drive letter, you will see volume label, total and available storage on the volume. It is important to note that by just looking at the “Storage” section, you cannot know if the volume is created from a local storage such as local disk connected to the Hyper-V host or from a LUN allocated from block-based storage such as Fibre Channel, iSCSI or Serial Attached SCSI (SAS).

How can I differentiate between Local and Remote Storage?

SCVMM does a great job in differentiating between local and remote storage. In case you need to see whether the volumes created on a Hyper-V host are from local or remote storage, you are going to look at the Storage Tab as shown in the figure 1.1 below:

Figure 1.1: Disk Section on Storage Tab

When a Hyper-V host is added under VMM management, VMM Agent collects the volumes configured on the Hyper-V and then takes the following actions:

All volumes created from a directly connected disk are added to “Local Storage” classification.

All volumes created from block-based storage are added under “Remote Storage” classification.

As you can see in the above screenshot, PHYSICALDRIVE0 disk is added under the “Local Storage” classification. It is because volume C:\ is created from a local disk attached to the Hyper-V host. Figure 1.2 below shows that PHYSICALDRIVE1 is added under the “Remote Storage” classification. This is because volume E:\ is created from a block-based storage device.

Figure 1.2: Disk Section on Storage Tab

There are other ways to differentiate between Local and Remote storage. You can also check Logical Unit ID of a disk. For a disk that is coming from a block-based storage will always have a unique GUID as shown in the screenshot above.

While the information provided on total capacity and available storage for each drive is useful, there is one setting that you would always want to pay attention to. The option “Available for placement”, as indicated in the red square in figure 1.0 above, is used by VMM to gather the list of storage devices that will be available for placing virtual machine files. When you deploy a virtual machine on a Hyper-V host via VMM, the Intelligent Placement feature of VMM will gather the list of storage devices available for placing the virtual machine. If VMM does not find any available storage for placing virtual machine files, you will receive an error message as shown in the figure 1.3 below.

Figure 1.3: Intelligent Placement Error

Do I need to check “Available for Placement” option for Local Storage?

By default, local storage devices will be available for placement. In other words, “Available for Placement” option is ticked for local storage. When deciding whether to check “Available for Placement” option for local storage or not, the only thing you need to keep in mind is that if workloads require high availability, you should select remote storage or shared storage. There is no point in making local storage available for virtual machine placements if all of your workloads require high availability, but nothing is stopping you from selecting “Available for Placement” option for local drives. It completely depends on your environment. If you need to store a virtual machine on local drives on a Hyper-V host, check “Available for Placement” option for local drives also.

VMM will show you drives that are available for placement when you click Browse button to select a drive for placing the virtual machine as shown in the screenshot below.

Figure 1.4

Summary

In this article we explained the Storage section that is available on the Hardware Tab of a Hyper-V host. Expanding the storage section will show you all volumes that are configured on the Hyper-V host. When you click on a volume, you will see volume label, total and available storage on the volume. By looking at the Storage Tab, you can identify if the storage allocated to Hyper-V host is from local disks attached to the Hyper-V host or block-based storage such as Fibre Channel, iSCSI or Serial Attached SCSI (SAS).

“Available for Placement” option that is available for every volume of Hyper-V host helps you block/unblock deployment of virtual machines to specific volumes. In case a volume is not available for the placement, Intelligent Placement of VMM will show an error when you try to deploy a virtual machine.

In the next part of this article series, we will focus on the Network Adapters section found on the Hardware Tab.

If you would like to read the other parts in this article series please go to:

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Nirmal Sharma

Nirmal Sharma is a MCSEx3, MCITP and was awarded the Microsoft MVP award in Directory Services and Windows Networking. He specializes in Microsoft Azure, Office 365, Directory Services, Failover Clusters, Hyper-V, PowerShell Scripting and System Center products. Nirmal has been involved with Microsoft Technologies since 1994. In his spare time, he likes to help others and share some of his knowledge by writing tips and articles on various sites and contributing to PowerShell-based Dynamic Packs for www.ITDynamicPacks.Net solutions.

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